


Dancing with Shadows

by Lady_Impala



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Memories, Past Child Abuse, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2018-09-13 05:24:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9108379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Impala/pseuds/Lady_Impala
Summary: It's been a long night for Tony Stark. Too much alcohol, not enough sleep. On his way to bed, he decides to take a detour through the archives of his past.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This piece is the result of three completely unrelated writing prompts: dancing with shadows, a clown wig, and a milkshake. Do with that knowledge what you will. :D Comments, as always, are appreciated!

This particular time of night, Tony usually saw rapidly diminishing returns in his work. Combining the witching hour with half a bottle of 15-year old Scotch did not help his case. He was currently stretched out under the chassy of his classic Rolls Royce, oil dripping down on his forehead. She didn’t get a lot of road time, and it looked like it had also been too long since he’d just run a tank of gas through her. Something had sprung a leak, hence his being covered in oil and grease.

The wrench in his hand slipped and bounced off his forehead, making him curse and try to sit up, subsequently slamming his forehead into the steel frame. He spat another violent curse as he gingerly laid his head back onto the cold concrete, taking a minute to let the world stop spinning.

“Sir,” chirped a soft female voice. “I think it might be time for you to call it a night.”

“Y’ think?” Tony groused, voice muffled from under the car. With several more obscene curse words, he shoved himself out from under the car and sat up more slowly, touching his forehead with the back of his hand. He hadn’t broken the skin, but it was a near thing. Not that he’d be able to tell with all of the grease. Wiping one hand down the side of his jeans, he grabbed the bottle of Scotch and staggered up from the floor, at least careful enough to avoid getting anything on the car. “Ok. Here we go.”

He made it to the elevator without incident, leaning against the wall as Friday sent it up to his floor. Eyes closed, he ran a quick assessment of his physical condition. Bruised, but fine. And headed rapidly for comfortably drunk. Lingering at the edges of his consciousness, waiting for a weakness, were his nightmares.

Fantastic.

Some nights, Tony was able to keep busy enough, or drunk enough, to keep them at bay. Apparently, tonight they were going to play catch up like old childhood friends. At least he had warning, he told himself.

On a whim, Tony reached forward and punched the button for the seventh floor. A floor he never visited, but kept continually curating. “Sir,” cautioned Friday, “are you sure tonight is—“

“Do it, Friday,” he snapped. She didn’t offer any additional argument, instead bringing the elevator to a halt on the floor he wanted. The doors slid open smoothly, revealing a dimly lit space. Tony stayed against the back wall, eyes distant as he steeled himself to step onto the floor.

If Friday had been a human, standing beside him, he would have moved just as she drew in a breath to speak. One steady, if hesitant, step at a time, he stepped off the elevator and stood just inside. 

It was like a tiny museum, the true history of Tony Stark. It was like a timeline, starting to the left of the elevator and wrapping around, coming to a stop just over halfway around the room. Giving room for new additions. There were no windows here. He couldn’t risk anyone seeing this by accident; too many weaknesses. 

Too much truth.

“I see you there,” he whispered into the dark.

There was no answer. Of course not. He was alone.

Hands folded behind his back, bottle dangling between his fingers, Tony began his circuit. It started with adoption papers. Baby pictures. The little booties he wore his first day home.

Maria had kept absolutely everything. After their death, the entire contents of their home had been packed up and stuck in storage. Tony couldn’t look at it for years. Even now, there were dozens of boxes still sealed shut, coated in a thick layer of undisturbed dust. He’d get to them eventually.

When he really wanted to feel bad about himself.

Each step moved Tony through his life, reminding him of where he came from, who he was. Admission papers from MIT when he was fifteen, graduation caps. Police reports that were swept under rugs. Pictures of his black eyes, the bruises on his arms.

Nothing was missing.

Every once in a while, he’d stop, looking over his shoulder. He had the distinct feeling he was being followed. It was absurd, but he couldn’t shake it. Additional Scotch didn’t help, at least not with that.

It wasn’t until he rounded the halfway point that he started to struggle with the memories. These were the freshest, but they also hurt the worst. Memories of good times, of people he considered his friends. People he trusted more than he trusted himself.

Staring at a picture of the group of them, snagged at some casual dinner out as friends, a flash of movement caught his eye. He flicked his wrist in an instinctive movement, his hand suddenly encased in the slick metal of his gauntlet. The pulsor hummed to life, aimed at a threat.

Which today was an iron Viking statue with a ridiculous clown wig on top.

Tony groaned and rolled his wrist again, the metal vanishing. He wandered over to it, gently fingering the tough, cheap curls of blue and white. It was…a birthday party. Clint’s? No, Steve’s. The wig was Natasha’s idea, as proven by the picture that hung above the statue. Natasha forcing the wig onto a grinning, laughing in that unbridled way that Tony had always envied. Laugh lines were cut deep around his mouth and his eyes, and he curled his fingers into a fist to resist the urge to trace them with the tip of his finger.

“I know you’re there,” he said again, turning his head to look over his shoulder out of his peripheral vision. “You may as well come out.”

When Tony turned fully around, there was a spectral vision before him of his father. He lifted the mostly-empty bottle and squinted at it. “You sure this isn’t absinthe, Friday?” he asked.

“It is not, sir. Besides, wormwood has not been used in absinthe since the late—“

“Yes, thank you, Friday. I know.” Tony pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers before dropping it with a heavy sigh and staring at the memory made real. “Come to dance, have you?” he asked.

Tony knew Howard Stark to be a volatile man, prone to fits of extreme temper and violence. This wasn’t the first time he’d hallucinated these arguments, old fights he wanted to rehash, have a second go at now that he knew better.

But now he knew too much. Knew what happened. It wasn’t just an accident; it was a deliberate attack, on his family. Whatever feelings he had about his father, someone had –killed- him.

That made this a little different this time around.

“I’m sorry,” Tony finally said, forcing himself to maintain eye contact with the spectre. “I didn’t…I didn’t know.”

“You should have,” the voice of memory said, mouth not moving. “You’re the genius, remember? How could you miss all the signs?”

“How the hell was I supposed to know?” he shot back, rolling his eyes and setting the bottle down. He’d thrown and broken more than one up here, and didn’t feel like dealing with it again. “It’s not like I’ve had the time to go digging around in old HYDRA files about their assets, and all their black ops.”

“No, you idiot,” Howard snapped, still not moving. “You should have known Rogers was –lying- to you.”

That brought Tony up short. He’d told himself that dozens of times, that he should have seen the signs. But he’d missed every single one. Even now, he wasn’t sure if he could pick them out.

“Are you really that blinded?” Howard continued, suddenly closer. “Did he really have you so suckered in to that charming all-American smile and those pretty blue eyes that you couldn’t see the truth –right in front of your face-?”

Tony flinched at the tone as if he’d been struck. Was that it? Was that why he’d let all the little signs, all the little clues slide? Why he’d given him the benefit of the doubt over and over again?

“No,” Tony protested with a shake of his head. “No. He wouldn’t…he wouldn’t do that to me.”

“He did!” The flare of Howard’s temper was familiar, bringing Tony’s head up, his focus to bear. “He lied to you, he pitted the team against you, and he destroyed you with your own weaknesses.”

“NO!” With an empty fist, Tony swung at the image of his father. With nothing for his fist to connect with, the movement spun him drunkenly around and dropped him hard onto his ass on the cold floor. He flopped back heavily onto the hardwood floor, groaning as the full implications of that little trip on the crazy train.

Tony was silent for a long time, listening to the sound of his own breathing. The uglier the truth he had to learn, the more often it presented itself in the voice of his father. Though it had been a long time since he’d been so hurt by it to take a swing at it.

Blindly reaching for the bottle, he poured the last of the contents down his throat, swallowing in thick, wet gulps before coming up for air with a gasp. 

"Hey Friday?" he said as the bottle rolled away. "Order me a milkshake."


End file.
